To Dennis, Doug, et all,
Has anyone, to date, tried to alloy gold (Au) with Germanium (Ge) to
create a heat treatable alloy of 14K or lower? This is, Ge, afterall
one of the alloying metals used in Argentium Sterling. I am not a
metallurgist, only a student jeweler. The other possibility would be
to research what are the common alloys used by horologists when
repairing antique watches. My suspicions are that if one were to
create a “screw blank” mold to cast several pieces in a large format
machine, or large production run, then with the use of a tap and die
it would be quite easy to create repeatable quality and quantity.
The only questions left would be: if there is a large enough market
for a precious metal fastener; whether or not color matching would
be an issue; and how prone to loosening would these fasteners be?
Michael L Gaebler
Texas Institute of Jewelry Technology